Pew Research Center is a nonpartisan fact tank that informs the public about the issues, attitudes and trends shaping the world. It does not take policy positions. The Center conducts public opinion polling, demographic research, content analysis and other data-driven social science research. It studies U.S. politics and policy; journalism and media; internet, science and technology; religion and public life; Hispanic trends; global attitudes and trends; and U.S. social and demographic trends. All of the Center’s reports are available at www.pewresearch.org. Pew Research Center is a subsidiary of The Pew Charitable Trusts, its primary funder.
This cites research conducted by Pew Research Center that speaks to specific questions posed by the Committee about the issue of “fake news.” The findings referenced include Americans’ discernment between made-up news and inaccurate news; their belief that made-up news is having a negative impact on the public’s understanding of current events; fairly low levels of trust in the news media, albeit more trust in news organizations than for news from friends and family or via social media; and very strong political divides in attitudes about the news media. Research also indicates that, in online contexts, there is less awareness of the news source when a link comes indirectly than when it comes from a news organization itself. The sense that fake news causes confusion about the basic facts of current events is widely shared across various demographic groups including political party, age, education, race and gender. Additionally, young adults express lower levels of interest in the news and less source awareness than older adults.
Further, our research finds that while the United States still maintains strong support for freedom of the press and freedom of expression, there are tensions stemming from digital developments combined with intense political divides. And, when asked how much responsibility three different entities – the government, social media sites and search engines, and the public – have for addressing the issue of misinformation, Americans collectively assign a fairly high and roughly equal amount of responsibility to all three entities.
Questions addressed
Our research finds that the public shows some discernment between what in our research we refer to as “completely made up news” and “misinformation.” A survey the Center conducted following the 2016 presidential election found that about one-in-three (32%) of U.S. adults often see completely made up news while about half (51%) say they often see news that is not fully accurate. (Another 39% say they “sometimes” see completely made up news, while 27% say this of not fully accurate news.)
While data from Twitter, Facebook and others has clearly revealed that content from fake news entities reached users of those platforms, it is also worth putting some context around the reach of this type of content. Our team conducted a case study of the most frequently appearing sites out of those linked to in all tweets about immigration during President Donald Trump’s first month in office (when immigration was a key topic in the news). There were 1,030 different sites linked to in at least 750 tweets, which became the threshold for consideration in this study. The analysis reveals that legacy and digital-native news organizations – entities that show evidence of original reporting in their most prominent articles – represented about four-in-ten of the most commonly linked-to sites (42%, the largest portion of any category of sites). And legacy news organizations accounted for twice as many sites as digital-native news organizations: 28% of all sites compared with 14%, respectively.
The study also finds little clear evidence that “fake news” sites were a major factor in the information stream on Twitter around immigration. Overall, just 2% of the sites catalogued in the study appeared on at least one of three external lists of “fake news” sites[1], and the vast majority of sites classified as News Organizations were established before 2015, suggesting they were not created solely for influence during the election.
While the study does not directly address the broader question of “fake news” entities’ influence on the public, or examine who is sharing what types of sites, it does shed light on the degree to which consumers are exposed to different types of information providers on a policy issue debated in the news.
Additionally, the Center conducted a study of U.S. media coverage of President Trump’s first 100 days in office. The study analyzed content from two dozen news outlets grouped according to the political leaning of their audience. It found that while the main storylines covered were similar, the types of sources included in the stories and the overall assessments of the administration’s words and actions differed. In other words, even more traditional news entities can differ in the takeaways they provide to members of the public about current events.
The Center’s research offers several different areas of insight into this question.
First, our research finds that most Americans believe that made-up news is having a negative impact on the public’s understanding of current events. Nearly two-thirds of U.S. adults (64%) say that made-up news has caused “a great deal of confusion about the basic facts of current events.” Another 24% say it has caused some confusion, while just 11% say not much or no confusion at all. In the same survey, roughly a quarter (23%) say they have themselves shared made-up news – with about equal portions indicating that they found out later that it was made up (16%) and that they knew at the time it was made up (14%).
Various studies we have conducted also indicate fairly low levels of trust in the news media – although higher levels of trust for news media than for news that comes from friends and family or from social media. A quarter of Americans (25%) say they trust news and information from local news organizations “a lot,” and 20% say so of local news organizations. That outpaces the 15% who say the same of news and information from friends and family, and all three far exceed the 5% who say that of information from social media. This does not suggest that people are not getting news from social media, but that people’s initial reactions are distinct when they assess the accuracy of the news they get from social media.
Compared with other institutions, a separate study finds that roughly twice as many Americans say the news media have a negative effect on the way things are going in the country as say they are having a positive effect: 63% versus 28%. That is a more negative rating than the public gives banks and financial institutions (46%), colleges and universities (36%), labor unions (32%) or churches (26%). Overall, the portion of Americans who feel the news media have a positive or a negative effect on the way things are going in the country has remained pretty steady since 2010, with roughly a quarter to 30% saying they have a positive effect.
The real shift in media attitudes has been along political lines. The partisan differences, already wide, have grown even wider. Democrats’ views of the effect of the national news media have grown more positive over the past year, while Republicans’ views remain overwhelmingly negative. About as many Democrats and Democratic-leaning independents think the news media have a positive (44%) as negative (46%) impact on the way things are going in the country. The share of Democrats holding a positive view of the news media’s impact has increased 11 percentage points since last August (33%). Republicans, by about eight-to-one (85% to 10%), say the news media have a negative effect. These views have changed little in the past few years.
Further, Democrats and Republicans also now disagree more than ever on a fundamental issue of the news media’s role in society: whether news organizations’ criticism of political leaders primarily keeps those leaders from doing things they shouldn’t – or keeps them from doing their job (a role we refer to as the media’s “watchdog” role).
While in 2016 members of both parties were equally supportive of this role of the news media (about three-quarters of both), as of early 2017, 89% of Democrats express support compared with 42% of Republicans. This is the greatest divide ever reported going back to Ronald Reagan’s presidency, when we began asking the question. This partisan split is found in other attitudes about the news media, though none in so dramatic a fashion as with the watchdog role.
Another element at play is the question of source awareness. In a separate study, we found that when following a link to get to a news story, consumers could name the source of the links they clicked on 56% of the time, on average. But recall levels differed based on where that link came from: Consumers could name the source 78% of the time when the link came directly from a news organization email or text, but only about half the time when it came indirectly through social media or a friend’s emails.
The sense that fake news causes confusion about the basic facts of current events is widely shared across various demographic groups including political party, age, education, race and gender. Those with a lower household income were somewhat less likely to express this view than those with higher incomes. The breaks are also similar when it comes to the portion that sees made-up news, with the two areas of difference being race, where whites are more likely than nonwhites to say they see it; and income, where those with higher household incomes are more likely to say they see it.
Age comes into play in the degree to which one may or may not be more or less susceptible to fake news. Younger adults express lower overall interest in news than older adults. About one-in-six of 18- to 29-year-olds follow local news (15%) and national news (16%) very closely, compared with 41% and 46% of those ages 50-64, respectively. They are also more likely to get news online: 53% of those ages 18-29 say the often get news online, while just 35% of those ages 50-64 do. And while they are just as likely to click on news links online as older adults, they show less awareness of the source of that link. A study that asked Americans twice a day over the course of a week about their recent digital news experiences found that between 31% and 37% across age groups had clicked on a news link in the past two hours. But when asked to write in the name of that source, 18- to 29-year-olds could do so about half the time (47%), at least 10 percentage points less than their elders (57% for 30- to 49-year-olds and 61% for those 50 and older).
There are multiple dynamics that have left the environment ripe for both misinformation and made-up news, one of which is revenue potential.
First, we now have in the U.S. almost full digital penetration for news. About nine-in-ten adults get at least some news online, including 67% on social media in particular. This means the online news space now includes more Americans, who may be less digitally savvy or aware of how to navigate the web, as well as those who follow news less closely or have less overall knowledge about current events.
The continued growth in online revenue combined with the ease of publishing online – including anonymously – draws more types of content providers into the space, and in larger overall quantities. We know, for example, that 20% of Americans got at least some of their 2016 election news directly from the campaigns, and 23% from advocacy organizations or interest groups.
At the same time, in the U.S. there is a very deep-seeded belief in freedom of the press and freedom of expression. In a survey of 38 countries, the Center found that Americans express more willingness than the rest of world to tolerate forms of speech: Large majorities in the U.S. think people should be able to say things that are offensive to their religious beliefs or to minority groups. About half (52%) say this about sexually explicit statements, and 44% think calls for violent protests should be allowed. This support among Americans surpasses the global median in every case.
Americans also express strong support for freedom of the press. A survey following the Charlie Hebdo attacks in Paris found that, among those who heard about the attacks, a majority (60%) said it was okay to publish the cartoon. And when asked why they thought it was okay, 70% cited freedom of the press as a reason.
When asked how much responsibility three different entities – the government, social media companies and search engines, and the public – have for addressing the issue of misinformation, Americans collectively assign a fairly high and roughly equal amount of responsibility to all three entities. Fully 45% say government, politicians and elected officials have a great deal of responsibility, roughly equal to the shares that say a great deal of responsibility lies with members of the public (43%) and with social networking sites and search engines (42%).
While each of these three groups was seen as responsible by about an equal share of the public, it is not the case that every American thinks each bears a great deal of responsibility. In fact, only 15% of U.S. adults say this of all three groups, while 58% named one (31%) or two (27%) of the three groups.
Age is the only area where clear demographic differences emerge. Americans ages 50 and older are more likely to place a great deal of responsibility on the government (53%) than those ages 18-49 (38%). There are no demographic differences for how much responsibility the public or social networking sites and search engines owe.
There is also a partisan difference on how much responsibility the government has to prevent the spread of fake news. While about half of both Republicans (48%) and Democrats (49%) say the government has a great deal of responsibility, only about four-in-ten independents (38%) say so.
There are no partisan differences in terms of the responsibility assigned to the two other groups, however.
February 2018
Appendix: Relevant Reports
Publics Globally Want Unbiased News Coverage, but Are Divided on Whether Their News Media Deliver [Release date: January 2018]
Covering President Trump in a Polarized Media Environment [Release date: October 2017]
URL: http://www.journalism.org/2017/10/02/covering-president-trump-in-a-polarized-media-environment/
Sharp Partisan Divisions in Views of National Institutions [Release date: July 2017]
URL: http://www.people-press.org/2017/07/10/sharp-partisan-divisions-in-views-of-national-institutions/
Americans’ Attitudes About the News Media Deeply Divided Along Partisan Lines [Release date: May 2017]
How Americans Encounter, Recall and Act Upon Digital News [Release date: February 2017]
URL: http://www.journalism.org/2017/02/09/how-americans-encounter-recall-and-act-upon-digital-news/
Trump, Clinton Voters Divided in Their Main Source for Election News [Release date: January 2017]
Many Americans Believe Fake News Is Sowing Confusion [Release date: December 2016]
URL: http://www.journalism.org/2016/12/15/many-americans-believe-fake-news-is-sowing-confusion/
The Modern News Consumer [Release date: July 2016]
URL: http://www.journalism.org/2016/07/07/the-modern-news-consumer/
Global Support for Principle of Free Expression, but Opposition to Some Forms of Speech [Release date: November 2015]
After Charlie Hebdo, Balancing Press Freedom and Respect for Religion [Release date: January 2015]
[1] The Center created a combined list of 468 websites by merging relevant “fake news” lists produced by: BuzzFeed (https://github.com/BuzzFeedNews/2017-12-fake-news-top-50), FactCheck.org (https://www.factcheck.org/2017/07/websites-post-fake-satirical-stories/), and Politifact (http://www.politifact.com/punditfact/article/2017/apr/20/politifacts-guide-fake-news-websites-and-what-they/).